Devils CEO Lou Lamoriello last night insisted that the Devils will not enter bankruptcy, a possibility broached yesterday by former owner John McMullen if the Stanley Cup champs fail to pay him more than $48 million he claims he’s owed by midnight tomorrow.

“Bankruptcy will not happen,” Lamoriello told The Post.

Sources familiar with the situation agreed that PuckHoldings, the Devils’ ownership group, is not about to default on its debt, but could be trying to tie payment to a sale of the team. The Nets, once affiliated with the Devils under the same umbrella, are already in the process of being sold.

McMullen is unaware of any attempt to sell the Devils, he said. But sale or no sale, McMullen said he is “guaranteed” most of the $48 million – the current value of the $30 million note he’s been holding since the team’s sale.

“We expect to get paid,” McMullen told The Post yesterday. “I think they have the money. These guys have it.”

PuckHoldings, whose principals bought the team from McMullen three years ago for an estimated $195 million, including some $20 million in debt.

The purchase, which was some $60 million higher than the franchise’s then-reported value, was supposed to unite the Devils and Nets in an effort to bolster the campaign for a new arena in Newark. It was also intended to give the YES Network a hockey component.

But fortunes changed quickly; YankeeNets, believed to own only a 10-percent stake in the Devils, is now unraveling, and the Newark arena project is all but dead.

Nonetheless, PuckHoldings must pay McMullen – and if they default, the former owner says, they will not do so without consequence.

“Then they go into bankruptcy,” McMullen said. “But they have the money.”

But Lamoriello last night painted a different picture.

“The financial situation of the team is fine,” Lamoriello said. “Obligations will be fulfilled.”

McMullen was not believed to have been actively trying to sell the team in 2000, but he was unable to resist the windfall offer for his franchise, which was at that time valued at some $135 million.

McMullen, who bought the old NHL Colorado Rockies in 1982 for some $33 million and then moved the franchise to New Jersey, said he has no intention of granting his debtors an extension.

“I don’t think they need it,” said McMullen, who twice threatened to move the Devils out of New Jersey. “We’re going to get paid, one way or the other. I don’t think they can afford to go into bankruptcy.

“In the final analysis, it will be to their benefit [to retire the debt].”

McMullen, who once offered to pay for a new arena over the Hoboken rail yards if the state would grant the airspace, lamented the Devils’ current financial condition.

“It’s a disaster over there,” McMullen said. “There are so many owners involved. It breaks my heart to see this franchise like that.

“The state had a good thing when it had us,” he added. “It just didn’t take care of us.”